Firefighters Recognized For Saving Girl In Upper West Side Fire That Injured 24

UPPER WEST SIDE, NY — Firefighters and paramedics were recognized for saving the life of a young girl during a four-alarm Upper West Side fire that injured 24 people, 6 seriously, in December.

FDNY Paramedic Silvana Uzcategui and Paramedic Joseph Losquadro of Station 35, and Lt. Brendan Mohan and Firefighter Michael Wasielesky from Ladder 24 were recognized by the girl's school — Success Academy Upper West — for their efforts in rescuing the child found inside a smoke-filled stairway during the December 22 fire.

The girl was found hiding in the stairway on the building's 26th floor and initially aided by nurses and doctors living in the building, according to a post on the FDNY's Facebook page. Firefighters and paramedics then rushed the girl down 26 flights of stairs to EMS responders waiting in the building's lobby.

“Due to the fact that the fire was ongoing, the elevators were shut off and there was smoke in the stairwells, EMS members could not get to the 26th floor where the patient was located. Firefighter Wasielesky carried the patient over his shoulder down 3-4 stairwells, then I took her, and we kept alternating every 3 flights. We met EMS in the lobby of the stairwell," Uzcategui said.

The fire erupted around 5 p.m. on the third floor of a 33-story building at 515 West 59th Street between 10th and West End avenues. The fire is believed to have started in an apartment unit on the building's third floor, an FDNY spokesman told Patch the night of the fire. Fire marshals ruled that the cause of the fire was accidental and a result of the careless use of an open flame or candle. In the apartment unit where the fire broke out the smoke alarm was not operational, fire marshals said.

Twenty-four people, 20 civilians and 4 firefighters, were injured during the fire, FDNY officials told Patch in December. Six people, all civilians, were taken to hospitals with serious injuries.

A resident of nearby building posted a video showing flames streaming out of two windows on the building's third floor. The video also shows the massive FDNY response, with firetrucks lining the Upper West Side block.

Photo by FDNY